Betty should be happy, she thinks. She has everything she has ever wanted.
She has this house, this adorable little family home, that she scrimped and saved and worked and worked for.
She has a job, not at Victory Munitions, not since the war ended, but one that isn't street fighting and one that she's paid well enough for.
And she has Kate.
Well, that's the thing, isn't it?
She has Kate in every way except the one that really matters. That's what gets her. That's what always gets her.
Usually, it doesn't matter. Usually, she refuses to let it bother her. Usually, she pretends like it's completely fine that she lives with the girl she's in love with, the one who doesn't have any romantic feelings for her in return.
But Kate had needed somewhere to live, and Betty could never have lived with herself if she didn't at least offer her a room.
But when Kate insists that they do domestic stuff like this - dousing their front room in paper snowflakes and using tinsel on the porch, something in Betty crumbles.
After Kate's hand brushes against hers for the fifth time, while they're putting ornaments up, she shakes her head before running out onto the porch, into the cold air and leans her arms into the railing.
There are days when she thinks she can't do this, and this is one of them.
Kate, clearly not getting it, follows her anyway. "Betty? We weren't done with the tree."
"Kate, don't," Betty says stiffly. "Go back inside. Finish the tree without me."
"What's wrong?" Kate asks.
Betty shakes her head. If Kate got it, if Kate ever really got it, she wouldn't ask.
"Betty? I have something I want to show you," Kate says. "But you have to come back in."
"Kate, I can't," Betty says, sniffling against the cold. "Not...not right now."
"I will bring it out to you then," Kate says.
Betty buries her head in her arms as the door slams shut behind Kate and wonders why she had to fall for someone so dense.
Except, when Kate comes back outside, despite her weary resignation, Betty looks up to see Kate shyly ducking behind a sprig of mistletoe. "I... I think this isn't what I thought it was. I thought it was wrong, Betty. I did. But I ... "
Betty, remembering the brief taste of Kate's lips from before, decides she doesn't care what Kate thought and presses her firmly into the door.
They don't stop until five minutes later when Gladys begins tapping on their railing and asks, "Should I come back?"
"This doesn't surprise you?" Kate asks as she wipes at her mouth.
"The only thing that surprises me," Gladys says, "is that it took you this long to realize you were in love with Betty. Though I might recommend some privacy bushes if you plan on doing this on your porch again."